Wednesday, November 15, 2017

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Arisa White

Cave Canem
graduate fellow Arisa White [photo credit: Nye' Lyn Tho] received her MFA from UMass, Amherst, and is
the author of Black Pearl,Post Pardon, Hurrah’s Nest, andA Penny Saved. Her recent collection You’re the Most Beautiful Thing that Happenedwas
a nominee for the 29th Lambda Literary Award and the chapbook “Fishing
Walking” and Other Bedtime Stories for My Wife won the inaugural Per Diem Poetry Prize. As the creator of
the Beautiful
Things Project, Arisa curates cultural events and artistic collaborations
that center narratives of queer people of color. She serves on the board of
directors for Nomadic Press and is
a faculty advisor at Goddard College. arisawhite.com

1 - How did your first book change
your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it
feel different?

My first book, Hurrah’s
Nest, brings attention to familial traumas and silences; I learned to write
from a critically affirming place with that collection. To look critically with
love and that then allows for some kind of release to happen, healing to occur.
My most recent collection, You’re the
Most Beautiful Thing That Happened, doesn’t feel different—it’s base is the
same; I’m allowing some things to take center stage. You’re the Most centers queer black female experiences and the
forthcoming chapbook “Fish Walking” and
Other Bedtime Stories for My Wife is quite playful with language. It’s
surreal and spiritual. I’ve challenged myself to not rely so much on the
metaphor—there’s an unmasking I’m doing, which feels vulnerable, however, now,
I’m imagining that all things co-exist in my reality, all ways of experiencing
a moment.

2 - How did you come to poetry
first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?

Poetry is closest to my way of speaking and being in the
world. We are such a perfect match—that poetic eye/I is present in my prose and
dramatic writing.

3 - How long does it take to start
any particular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is
it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape,
or does your work come out of copious notes?

Starting is easy; it’s finishing that’s the challenge. Often
I need to go away on retreat to truly finish a project—to get into it and
notice the absences, the places where it doesn’t cohere. I need uninterrupted
time to relate to it.

My first drafts, that is what I transcribe from the notebook
to the screen, come out looking nearly close to its final shape. In my
notebook, I’m working out the emotional truth of the poem and whether what it’s
communicating is in alignment with my intentions—or sometimes I’m so surprised
by what comes out that the poem shifts me.

4 - Where does a poem usually begin
for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger
project, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?

I have an idea, but first the idea has to make its presence
felt in my body before I’m moved to bring it to the page. Sometimes the idea
can remain in the head, and I’ll make a note of it. But when my whole body
concedes, it’s writing time. Maybe I’m often cross-training—writing individual
pieces as they come and writing poems specific to book-length projects.

5 - Are public readings part of or
counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing
readings?

I do enjoy readings and reading my work. When working on a
project, and when the poems have stabilized themselves, I’ll bring them to the
public. Reading to an audience is so much different than reading aloud to
yourself, in your familiar rooms—the work has a chance to bounce off other
bodies, take up a different space. It is then that I’m able to experience the
work as its own distinct presence. I recognize where it is strong and the areas
that need development.

6 - Do you have any theoretical
concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer
with your work? What do you even think the current questions are?

Is there a water style? An earth style? I’m considering how
the elements can be a way to craft the poem.

What is a queer black female aesthetic? How does it feel
when I write out of queerness or blackness? Sometimes the two feel the same. My
female body is a constant—it informs my everything. How my body is labeled (by
force or by choice) is variable.

7 – What do you see the current role
of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you
think the role of the writer should be?

The role of the writer is to shake
us free from master(ing) narratives.

8 - Do you find the process of
working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?

When an editor is good, she is essential. My
editor/publisher Kate Angus was an extraordinary person to work with on my
latest collection You’re the Most
Beautiful Thing That Happened. Her comments and suggestions for reordering
the poems revealed gaps in the emotional arc of the collection. She edits with
an understanding of how I like to use language and as a result, the language
has extra pop.

9 - What is the best piece of advice
you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?

Follow your obsessions, the things that catch and hold your
attention. And I find this especially helpful on those days when I’m wondering,
What do I write?

10 - What kind of writing
routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day
(for you) begin?

In the past 10 years, I have relied on The Daily Grind (TDG)
to give routine to my writing. TDG operates online and each month you sign up
and are assigned a group of writers to send work to each day. When signing up,
you select if you want to be in a group working on New Poetry, New Prose,
Revised & New Poetry, and my favorite is Manic Mixture. There is no
commenting on each other’s work. You are showing up each day, sharing writing
that you are capable of completing within that 24 hours. Why I like Manic
Mixture is because, as my life has broadened as a writer—in addition to writing
poetry, I’m writing plays, essays, course descriptions, interview responses,
etc.— I don’t need to separate how writing shows up in my life. It is actively
a part of who I am.

These past two months, I’ve been beginning my day with
meditation. I then check emails, especially on the weekdays, and make a to-do
list of the top things I need to get done for the day. Usually, writing comes
in the evening, 4-8pm. Weekends, I wake up, meditate, read, and do some
writing, but I allow myself to be chill about it, especially if I don’t have
any deadlines to meet.

11 - When your writing gets stalled,
where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?

I return to books and art. I return to life, to the people
in the streets and bars, to my friends, to the shit going on in the world, to
the sun on my face, instead of the glow of a screen. I go for a walk.

13 - David W. McFadden once said
that books come from books, but are there any other forms that influence your
work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?

All things influence my work—my experience of the world
(word) is relational, so my work arises from the intersection of all things.

14 - What other writers or writings
are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

I read a healthy amount of theory, cultural studies,
spiritual and metaphysical texts, and enjoy my fair share of popular culture.
Poetry is the way I synthesize my various encounters in the world—and I like to
imagine myself as the point in which all those encounters intersect.

15 - What would you like to do that
you haven't yet done?

I would like to live in another country for more than a
year. I love the experience of being in another culture, in another
consciousness. The world becomes so much larger than where I claim citizenship.
I get to step out of the echo chamber of my country, its pathologies, and learn
to relate to my body outside of the national discourses that serve to limit how
I access and actualize my humanity.

16 - If you could pick any other
occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you
would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?

Honestly, I don’t know what I would have done if not this.
I’m very sure I would have been in the arts—maybe a professionally trained
dancer. However, I have always wanted to come up with the names for nail
polishes and lipsticks.

17 - What made you write, as opposed
to doing something else?

Desire—if my heart isn’t in it, it’s
not worth my energy.

18 - What was the last great book
you read? What was the last great film?

I’m currently working on a children’s book in verse, which I
am co-authoring with Laura Atkins. The book is about Bridget “Biddy” Mason who
was enslaved, starting in Georgia, and with her Mormon master, walked to Utah
then California where she petitioned for her freedom. Later she became a
philanthropist and wealthy landowner in Los Angeles. Slated for publication in
early 2019, this is the second book in the Fighting for Justice series, published by Hey Day Books.